Macbeth (Justin Kurzel 2015)

and so anyway it turns out that the best thing about Macbeth (2015) is not Michael Fassbender’s chameleon-like performance, in which his face alternates, depending on the line and the lighting, with those of Christian Bale, Ralph Fiennes, Jamie Dornan, Eddie Izzard and others, nor is it the decision to have everyone mumble the dialogue in Scottish accents broad to the point of caricature, even the actors with actual Scottish accents, nor the instruction from the tourist board to film in some of the most beautiful places north of the border but in a bleak way so as simultaneously to attract wealthy tourists and discourage the other kind who used to go on cheap and sunny European holidays before Brexit, no, the best thing about Macbeth is the way in which it relentlessly trolls the audience with bad audio-visual puns – from rethinking how to get Birnam woods to Dunsinane (the clue is in the name of the woods), to repeatedly standing Macbeth’s best friend (Paddy Considine) next to a goat, to always shooting Duncan’s son (Jack Reynor) in between two other people – but then sneaking into the background of Lady Macbeth’s (Marion Cottilard) hand-washing scene a black and white dog – who is piebald and never at any point dismissed…